Monthly Archives: September 2008

A pretty normal menu this week, except that we’ll have friends over on Saturday. They’re coming to help hubby fix a large hole in the ceiling around our swamp cooler…so I’m planning a fun meal for hungry workers. The menu for Saturday is one you may want the whole recipe for, so I’ll post complete recipes for the Carbonara and Pavlova dessert later on.

Monday: Garlic-studded roast, garlic mashed potatoes, carrots and onions, steamed broccoli. Take a beef roast and poke holes all over all sides of it, cut garlic into slices and poke these deep into the holes. Slice one sweet onion into thick rings, and place these in a deep roaster (I used the crockery part of my crock pot). Pour some baby carrots over the onion, and place the roast on top of the vegetables. Bake at 350 until the roast is 160 degrees. Boil potatoes and garlic until soft, then mash with half a stick of gluten free/dairy free butter substitute, or add some olive oil. Season with sea salt and black pepper. Steam broccoli for several minutes until crisp-tender. Slice roast and layer down the center of a large serving platter, add the cooked carrots and onion on one side of the meat and the broccoli on the other. Serve with mashed potatoes and gravy made with the drippings from the roast and gluten free beef broth, thickened with corn starch. Yum!

Tuesday: Roast beef sandwiches on homemade gluten free bread, cranberry sauce, and left over mashed potatoes. I made a large loaf of GF bread, sliced it into sandwich slices, and I’m keeping it in the fridge. Heat the bread until warm and soft, add mayo, spicy brown mustard, lettuce, red onion, dill pickles, and a slice of left over roast beef. Serve with cranberry sauce (canned or, in our case, left over frozen whole berry sauce) and left over mashed potatoes.

Wednesday: Pasta bake. Cook some GF pasta according to package directions. In a skillet, cook 1 lb ground beef with 1 chopped onion, drain and set aside. Quickly cook one chopped zucchini and some garlic in the pan, until crisp-tender. Return ground beef to pan, add a bottle of GF spaghetti sauce, and mix well. Place noodles in a pan, pour the sauce over the noodles, and stir. Sprinkle some GF bread crumbs (or use pulverized Chex cereal…crispy and easy) mixed with Italian herbs over the top and bake until warm through. You may add cheese on top if you can have cheese…some grated mozzarella and Parmesan would be excellent.

Thursday: Cajun Beans and Rice, warm bread, and salad. Soak a bag of dark red, large kidney beans overnight. Rinse. Place beans, a bay leaf, lots of crushed garlic, some sea salt, and a little red pepper in a crock pot. Cover with water and let simmer all day. A few hours before dinner, check to make sure beans have enough water. Add more if need be, along with one chopped Kielbasa sausage. Cook 2 more hours. Serve over cooked brown rice with pepper sauce for those who want it, with warm GF bread and butter and a green salad (if you won’t be home all day, you can add the sausage with beans in the morning and cook all day).

Saturday: Spaghetti Carbonara and salad, Pavlova for dessert. This is a family favorite, and we often make it for guests. NOT dairy free, though…so Isaiah will have to have gf/dairy free frozen pizza (Amy’s brand, we add extra toppings). Boil some gluten free spaghetti in a large pot. While it cooks, crumble 1 pound cooked bacon (I do the bacon in advance on an electric griddle, or buy prepared cooked bacon…Hormel is GF). In a blender, blend heavy cream, garlic, egg yolks, and Parmesan until smooth. Add salt and pepper and blend again. Drain noodles, return to the pot and toss with 1/2 stick of butter. Pour the sauce over the noodles, return pot to stove top and cook briefly while tossing the pasta. Add bacon and a can of sliced black olives and mix well. Serve with extra cheese to sprinkle on top, and a big tossed salad. Use the left over egg whites to make Pavlova….a crisp meringue crust with lemon curd and sliced fruit on top.

Sunday:Smorgasbord (aka…left overs) Cajun beans and rice, Spaghetti Carbonara, Pasta Bake…whatever else is in the fridge. Spread everything out on the counter, and add bread and sandwich supplies if it looks like there’s not enough left overs to go around. Make sure you have some fruits and vegetables to choose from as well (raw are fine, maybe with some Ranch dip), and let everyone go through and choose what they like.

1 Chronicles 16:36a “Praise be to the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting.”

Lord! How can I bend and shape these clumsy words to praise your creation? They fall too short, they will not suffice. Praise you, Father, for your glory! Praise you for the beauty that takes away my breath and leaves me speechless. Thank you for the splendor of these Autumn days. You didn’t have to make them so glorious…but you did!

Numbers 91-100 of the Gratitude Journal….in Photos because words fail me.Photos taken in Big Cottonwood Canyon and Guardsman’s Pass, yesterday afternoon. Click the images to see a large image…amazing!91.

It’s dawn. As the sun’s arc begins to break over the sandy horizon, rays of light burst forth above the desert. You see the change in light through closed eyes, your body is used to waking with morning’s first sun. Around you, in the tent, your family still sleeps hard. Silently, you rub the sleep from your eyes and extract yourself as carefully as possible from tangled limbs, heavy with sleep. You gaze a moment at your sleeping husband, your children dreaming peacefully, limbs flung in slumbering abandon. You move carefully, noiselessly, not wanting to wake them. Your day always seems smoother, flows more gently, when you have these early morning moments alone with Yahweh.

As you gently pull aside the flap of your hide tent, you feel the cool morning air fall into the tent like a breath. You wrap a woven shawl around your shoulders, the cool of this desert morning will not last long…but you will cherish it while it does. The sand beneath your feet still feels warm, despite the cooler night…warmth from the previous day, radiating back. You bend to pick up the heavy earthen jar that sits beside your tent. Its clay walls are tall and thick, made of the ruddy-red clay of another, distant land. Egypt’s clay. Here in the desert, this jar is a reminder of where you came from, a piece of the past carried so many miles to this desert place. “In your unfailing love you will lead the people you have redeemed. In your strength you will guide them to your holy dwelling. ” Exodus 15:13

Egypt’s clay…the jar of a slave, a simple and utilitarian vessel. What is it, here? Who are you, in this dry testing ground? Not a slave, now. But how sparse and dependant is this freedom! There is no clay in the desert. This jar will have to last.

The clay jar heavy on your shoulder, you move quietly away from the tent. Around you, resting like snowflakes atop the warm sand, spreads a shimmering sheen, glinting in the morning sun. The ground is white, bright like frost, glimmering as far as the eye can see. This is your daily bread, this is your sustenance. Bread from heaven, manna. To be gathered this one morning, eaten this one day. Your hands did not make this bread, and they cannot will it into being, change it or make it disappear. Your hands are only meant to gather it, which they do as they have done each morning these many years. Stoop, fill cupped hands, let light flakes sift down into the heavy jar at your side. This will feed you and your family today, and today alone.“Then the LORD said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions. On the sixth day they are to prepare what they bring in, and that is to be twice as much as they gather on the other days.” Exodus 16:4

This is the sparse dependence to which Yahweh has delivered you, this is the reprieve from slavery and the testing ground on which He refines His people, fire in the desert furnace burns the dross and leaves the silver. You remember, as you gather wisps of bread in your hands, the fear of those first weeks. Had He led your people away from Egypt’s cruelty, only to let them perish of starvation in the heat of the desert? You remember that first morning, as the manna sifts between your fingers and fills the jar. What miracle was this, this white horizon in the desert? This substance you had never before seen or imagined, come from the sky out of the hand of He who Is. As the jar at your side fills, nearing the level that you know to be just enough, you remember the first days. Remember filling the jar past full, remember folding manna into a square of homespun wool, tucking it away in case tomorrow’s sun rose over empty desert sand instead of daily bread. Have you learned to trust? Are there still slivers of doubt each morning, as your eyes eagerly seek this day’s provision?

What happened when you gathered more than He allotted? You remember, as the last handfuls of manna fall into jar’s wide mouth and settle. You remember that morning, long ago, when you awoke and anxiously checked the contents of your Egyptian jar, saved by the tent’s door for tomorrow’s meal. What was, yesterday, sweet and fresh….seethed now with maggots. Your stomach turned, as you lifted the corner of the homespun cloth and saw yesterday’s sustenance, now rendered beyond useless, teaming, seething, decaying before your eyes. The vileness of gluttony, the disgust of too much. You remember, as you lift your clay jar to your shoulder and begin to walk back to the tent where your family has begun to stir. You remember opening tent’s flap, panicked by this rancid bread, useless and vile. You saw, resting like a blanket of comfort, today‘s bread.…enough. Enough, for today alone. “….and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor. When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, “It is the bread the LORD has given you to eat. This is what the LORD has commanded: ‘Each one is to gather as much as he needs. Take an omer for each person you have in your tent.’ ” The Israelites did as they were told; some gathered much, some little. And when they measured it by the omer, he who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little. Each one gathered as much as he needed.” Exodus 16:13b-17

The morning is upon you, the sun has made her climb into the impossible blue of a vast desert sky. You feel its warmth upon your shoulders, you see the other women making their way back to waking families, to begin this day. The sounds of your stirring children reach your ears as you come near the tent, a tinkling laugh pierces morning’s quiet as young ones greet the day. Around you, in all directions, manna is disappearing with the warmth of the sun, it melts into the ground and leaves the landscape around you as though nothing had ever rested there. Enough for the day, no more, no less. You are no longer a slave, but in this new freedom you are learning…it is the Lord alone who sustains you, it is He who carries you, provides for you, gives you life. Clinging to Him, here in this desert place, is all you can do.

It is enough, no more, no less. It is always enough.

“As thy days, so shall thy strength be;”—Deuteronomy 33:25Lord, let me know this day that you will provide. Let me rest in the knowledge that you have us covered, that you know my needs and that, from your vast store of plenty, you will provide for me and for my family…our daily bread. Help me be content with Enough, with the daily bread that only you provide. Help me live in this day, and not worry about the next…you WILL provide, and Enough is all we need. Amen!

My friend Dawn and I spent a day canning together. What a blessing to work together, side by side, talking and sharing while our hands are busy putting food away for the winter. There is something about this “putting away” that appeals to my nature, a sort of nurture and love that goes into the process. We’re putting away nourishment for the family, we’re going through the motions of preserving this fresh food that will appear on the table again and again, in the cold months to come. The easy nature of a friendship cemented in Christ warms the heart as we peel, slice, sterilize and boil. The sounds of seven children, playing happily around the house warms the heart as much as the steam warms the kitchen. There is a satisfaction in setting aside hot jars filled with fruit, jam, and butters that seems to go down to our roots….I think of the generations of women before me who went through these very steps, changed so little over time. The foods grown in home soil, picked with worn but loving hands, put away to rest on shelves all winter long. I think of the women who had to do this, with every sort of available food, to ensure that their families would have something to eat. I think of long winters, the garden laying spent beneath a blanket of snow, a family sitting around a rough-hewn table in a log cabin. Where else could they have turned? My jars sit side-by-side with cans of food from the store, theirs alone would feed the family until the next harvest. It gives me cause to consider, to remember, to respect. Perhaps more than a desire to eat peaches all winter long, that’s what makes me get out the canner every year. Thankful for a good harvest, and for the women in my life…both past and present…who warm my kitchen and heart with their help and friendship! Here are some photos from the last week’s work….

Jars and rings, ready to be sterilized. How grateful I am for our dishwasher!

Empty jars wait their turn

Supplies…

Peaches, blanched and ready to be peeled.

Peeled and soaking in fruit fresh, to keep them from turning brown.

Sliced and ready to be heated and packed

Jars cooling on the sideboard…listen for the lids to “pop”!My cleanup crew, erasing some of the sticky residue that covered the whole kitchen…

Well…it’s that time again. I had a little break, and I’m a day late this week but….here it is!

I’m not doing much in the way of meals lately. We’re getting back into the school routine and we are still finishing up with canning peaches (last day of peaches today!). This menu will lean heavily on the crock pot, which is fine since it’s starting to feel like fall. Bring on the comfort food!

Monday: Crock Pot Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya. Throw several cubed chicken breasts in a crock pot. Add large can of chopped tomato, three or four stalks of chopped celery, a chopped onion, several cloves of garlic, and two chopped bell peppers. Add several teaspoons of Cajun seasoning (we like ours flavorful, so I added four teaspoons). Add a little salt and some red pepper if you want. Let cook on low all day, an hour before dinner add a chopped zucchini, about a cup of frozen okra, and a chopped sausage (Hillshire Farms is GF). Let simmer for an hour, if there is too much liquid in the pot take the lid off to let it evaporate. Serve with cooked rice and a salad!

Tuesday: Band Practice Night. Hubby will be gone…so we’ll use this excuse to go easy for dinner. Baked potatoes with cooked cubed chicken, frozen broccoli, prepared bacon bits (Hormel brand is GF), cheese and sour cream for those who can have it and green onions. We may even throw a little canned chili on top (Hormel, Stag, or Western Family Thick and Chunky are all GF). Served with a green salad.

Thursday: Tacos. Ground beef cooked with a can of black beans and taco seasoning (try McCormic) and a little salsa. Serve with lettuce, tomatoes, chopped onion, cheese, sour cream, olives, salsa and avocado. Put out warm corn or rice tortillas, or serve as a salad over a bed of lettuce with corn chips crumbled on top.

Friday: Gluten Free Pizza. I like Bob’s Red Mill Pizza mix, quick and easy and really tasty. I prepare the mix as per package directions, and use a cookie sheet to bake it. Top with sauce (one can tomato sauce, one small can tomato paste, splash of lime juice, several cloves garlic, salt, basil and oregano…cook ’till bubbly and then put it on the pizza), Hormel turkey pepperoni, sliced green peppers, mushrooms, olives, red onion, a bit of blue cheese and shredded cheese. I leave one side cheeseless, sometimes I’ll add crumbled up soy cheese instead of regular. Serve with a green salad.

Saturday: Skillet Ratatouille. In a large skillet, cook a thinly sliced Hillshire Farms turkey sausage until browned. Remove the sausage and set aside. Add 2 sliced zuchinni, 2 small yellow squash, a sliced onion, several cloves of garlic, half a chopped green pepper and some olive oil. Cook until crisp-tender. Add the sausage back in, and throw in a can of chopped tomatoes. Cook until hot, then serve with brown rice and/or toasted gluten free bread (we like Kinnikinnik hamburger buns or English muffins).

Sunday: Pulled Beef over Garlic Mashed Potatoes with Mushrooms. Put a beef roast (a cheap one works fine) in the crock pot and throw in 3 cups of beef or chicken broth, some baby carrots, and one sliced onion. Add several cloves of pressed garlic and a bay leaf. Cook all day, an hour before dinner, use two forks to pull apart the roast. Add a package of sliced mushrooms, a cup of frozen green peas, and 2 tablespoons of corn starch mixed with warm water. You may need to add more broth as well at this point. Stir well and let simmer until thickened. In the meantime, boil peeled potatoes and about 7 cloves of garlic in a large pot until soft. Throw cooked potatoes and garlic in a mixer, mash well. Add butter or olive oil, add milk (soy, rice or regular) and salt and mix again. Serve the beef over mashed potatoes, with steamed broccoli on the side.

I started this a long time ago, but just had time to finish it now (between batches of peaches!). Rachel had always been sad that she wasn’t big enough to climb up the door frames…although it wasn’t from lack of trying! Finally, in May, her legs were big enough. She spent the morning climbing up and jumping down, gleefully enjoying the fact that she was finally part of the wall-crawling club! The kit is Cuosub by Loloden. I love the little birds!

His Hands…. how many times have you heard these two words together, in reference to God? I remember singing that timeless song as a child…”He’s got the whole world, In His Hands!” Often, when things are hard, I picture myself cradled in God’s hands, protected and safe. Perhaps even more often, I picture my children there. Sometimes when I am praying for someone, I envision them safely protected, nestled in His Hands.

I was curious this morning and did a search for those words in the Bible. What a picture was painted with the verses that contain those words! How loving, how powerful, how creative, how amazing His grace, how protected, how much about God you can learn when you read about His Hands….

Job 5:18For he wounds, but he also binds up; he injures, but hishands also heal.

Job 34:19[the Lord] who shows no partiality to princes and does not favor the rich over the poor, for they are all the work of hishands?

Job 36:32He fills hishands with lightning and commands it to strike its mark.

Psalm 19:1The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of hishands.

Psalm 95:5The sea is his, for he made it, and hishands formed the dry land.

Psalm 111:7The works of hishands are faithful and just; all his precepts are trustworthy.

Mark 8:25Once more Jesus put hishands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.

Mark 10:16And he took the children in his arms, put hishands on them and blessed them.Luke 4:40When the sun was setting, the people brought to Jesus all who had various kinds of sickness, and laying hishands on each one, he healed them.

Luke 13:12When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.

Luke 23:46Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into yourhands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last.

Luke 24:38He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet.

Luke 24:50[ The Ascension ] When he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up hishands and blessed them.

John 3:35The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in hishands.

I am amazed by how much you can learn about God, just by reading about what he does with His Hands.His hands created the universe! His hands are powerful and can strike down nations. His hands made all people and he loves them all equally. All creation is the work of His Hands.His hands are faithful. His hands heal. His hands bless. His hands are marked with the sacrifice he made, for us! We are all safe and loved when we are in His hands.

Knowing the work of His Hands, I can’t avoid taking a look at my own. What do I do with my hands? Do I use them to bless, to heal? To do God’s work? Are they folded idly in rest when they should be at work? Are they raised in anger, or in praise?

If you look up verses that contain his hands in reference to people, you get a much different picture. The contrast says as much about our nature as it does about God’s….raising his hands in anger, falling at his hands, being delivered into the hands of an enemy, prayers in the Psalms that David would avoid falling into the hands of men, righteous people are said to have clean hands, the hands of the fool are idle, Pilot washed his hands of the blood of Jesus, His blood is on our hands. On the other hand (no pun intended), God blesses the work of our hands, we lift our hands in praise, we clap our hands and sing songs to the Lord.

How will you use your hands today?

Lord, I thank you that you have the world in your powerful and gentle hands. Please help me use my hands today with your example always in mind. Help me strive to use my hands as you do…to create, to heal, to bless and protect. I ask that you use me, that you let the work of my hands be a light unto you. Let my hands be raised in praise!

Photo: Taken this morning and edited in Photoshop, a sunflower cradled in Sarah’s hands.

This week has not been….graceful. Well, actually…to be honest the week has been fine–it’s a framework of time in which (to an extent, anyway) I can choose to weave things in one way or another, just like any other week. The truth is, I have not been graceful.

We are in our second full week of school, and working out the flow of our days is taking time. The house is messy, we are not running on a smooth schedule yet, and there are so many things that are in need of attention! So many loose ends that need tying up. My patience has become a thin veneer, wearing off in patches and all too easily cracked and chipped. I haven’t been graceful in teaching my kids, and have snapped at them for things that I shouldn’t have. I have been distracted by all these little unfinished projects that seem to be screaming for my attention and it has been a struggle to keep my focus on what’s important.

The last few weeks, it seems like I go to bed with visions of perfect homeschool life dancing in my head. The children, heads bent over their books, peacefully studying. Laughing over a cup of hot cocoa on a recess break. Walking to the park for P.E., enjoying the autumn sun. I look forward to learning with the kids, I make plans to get the house clean, pick up the peaches that dot the back yard, can the mountains of fresh peaches that wait in laundry baskets in the cool basement.

The kids doing school, on a graceFUL day!

But the reality is, the kids wake up grouchy. They need redirection, they cut corners on their writing assignments, they balk at having to re-write pages that were too hastily finished. The concepts that took five minutes yesterday to master now seem beyond Eldest’s grasp. His mind is elsewhere, and it’s a struggle to bring it back. Middle child makes whining an art form when it’s time for spelling. The phone rings…should I answer, or finish reading this book aloud to Youngest? The floor we are sitting on needs vacuuming, and this thought distracts me from being fully present with the kids. Should I stop and vacuum? Or work harder to focus on what I’m doing now?

The day grinds down, what I thought would be finished by lunchtime has taken until late afternoon. The sky is overcast, reflecting my mood. Middle child and I go out and pick peaches, trying to get the last of them off the tree before the rain comes. I look at the yard…so many over ripe peaches to pick up! But it’s time for dinner, and this, too must wait. My frustration builds and I clean the counter yet again, only to fill it back up with preparations for dinner. The kids are wound up, they race around the house in a big circle at full speed. Eldest picks out some tunes on the piano, playing the same thing over…and over…and over. I grit my teeth, slice tomatoes, remind myself that it’s good for him to be playing and that the noise is bothering me because everything else is bothering me. At the end of the day, there is still a pile of dirty laundry in front of the washer. The cobwebs in the windows of our bedroom are still waiting to be vacuumed. Everything seems to need scrubbing. The perfect homeschool day I dreamed of the night before seems so far out of reach!

I feel weak, defeated, spread too thin.

The truth is, some days are like my perfect homeschool dream. Some days, things run smoothly and our spirits are high. Some days, we are able to finish our school work early, the house stays clean, and we have time in the afternoon to get together and play with friends. Those days, it’s easy to be happy and peaceful and grateful! It’s the days like yesterday, the weeks that there is too much work and too little time, that seem so….graceless. That’s the word that comes to mind…I feel about as graceful as a ballerina wearing lead boots!

But it’s in our lack of grace that God’s strength is apparent! 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 keeps popping up lately, in my reading, in my mind: “But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

His grace is sufficient. Not mine! Mine doesn’t have to be, mine isn’t going to be. And that’s OK. It’s not that I won’t try to be more graceful in getting daily life done, I will continue to try (and fail, and wake up and try again!). But it won’t be my own efforts that matter in the end, because His grace is sufficient. Mine, as can be seen all too clearly this week, is most decidedly Insufficient. Which is OK! It gives God’s grace chance to shine through. Weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, difficulties…the last few weeks seem to have been full of them. God is offering a hand here, holding it out to us! It’s OK to be weak. Take my hand, my grace is sufficient. He loves us, if we are stronger leaning on God in our weakness than we could ever be at the peak of our own strength! It’s OK.

Today is already going better. Eldest is excited again about his Algebra class, eager to explain to me about Eratosthenes’ sieve. All the things that need to be done, will be done…perhaps not in the time frame I would like and perhaps not as gracefully as I’d like. I’m going to have to remind myself often…his grace is sufficient!His grace, not mine.